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Windows can also get good power efficiency. While Windows 7 gets less battery life than OSX on a 2010 MBP, it does much better than Fedora 17 (OSX gets 7 vs Win7 getting 5 vs Fedora getting 3.5 -- and note that Win7 does not get Optimus on that setting due to the Apple-imposed Bootcamp restrictions, hence why Windows can get 7 hours on equivalent non-MBP hardware while Linux still gets ~3.5). So much for the "Apple can specialize" theory. Linux just sucks at power management, apparently. :/...

You know very well that hardware vendors provide their driver blobs optimized for Windows system while majority Linux distributions mainly have kernel userspace drivers based on the source and hardware specifications. You know very well a plain Microsoft Windows system without drivers from manufacturers themselves will have similar issue with whatever Linux distributions unless some of them have optimized driver coming straight from manufacturers. Dare to do the power test with only plain Windows operating system and say that it is more efficient.
Keeping repeating the same mantra while fully aware about the fact a Windows system relies on vendors priviledges only displays the level of hypocrisy.

You do raise some good points but:
1. Is this a Linux problem inherently or just Ubuntu being Ubuntu?
2. Is the issue inherent to Linux and the standard userland (e.g. lots of background processes that love to wakeup the CPU for dubious reasons and eat power)?
3. If the issue is not just Ubuntu and is not Linux in general, is it because of a lack of ACPI driver support on the Mac systems?

Unlike some people I'm not going to insult you for running Linux on Appler hardware (a certain Linus Torvalds has done the same thing...). I would like to know more about the scope of the problem though.

21 watts is a lot even for Linux. Asus Zenbook can go as low as 5W on Ubuntu with Unity3D. So, I suspect that their hardware is to blame.

21 watts is a lot even for Linux. Asus Zenbook can go as low as 5W on Ubuntu with Unity3D. So, I suspect that their hardware is to blame.

Someone already explained that it's most likely Nouveau keeping the GPU awake which explains the near constant ~12W extra power on Ubuntu regardless of the load. So, it's the lack of switchable graphics that's hurting here.

Since the author pretty well knows that hybrid gfx sucks on linux, he should've pointed out that the difference is due to the nouveau kernel module being loaded and burning 10+ watts of power. Same thing with Lenovo T420s, OOTB it consumes roughly 20W, and after disabling optimus from the bios it's something between 6,5-9W depending on other factors. Probably can't do the same on MBP, but blacklisting the kernel module should allow the same.

I was wandering the same. I think it makes sense to compare them with bumblebee installed. That should cut about half of the consumpltion.

needs power tuning

My mbp (no nvidia chip) nearly consumes same power on ubuntu as on osx. There are several points of optimization though which are sparsely documentated. E.g. I found that enabling AHCI mode using grub can save a lot of power. Also enabling the various powersave modes of the i915 driver does as well as dimming the panel/keyboard leds to the same level as on osx.

Even though the statement that you can optimize your linux to use less power is true, the truth is that most users won't do that (lack of knowledge or time). So it must be able to optimize itself. We shouldn't try to use the argument that windows also eats alot without the user installing specialized drivers because users are already trained to do that while a user switching to linux most likely doesn't know how to install drivers. Secondly, linux comes with tons of drivers so it should be able to optimize itself. And thirdly, after all wasn't linux supposed to be better? Since when are we emulating windows behavior?

You give the average user a lot of credit. I don't think most windows users know how to install a driver, otherwise MS wouldn't have Windows Update doing it for you. Even then, WU doesn't get them all, and then all device manager will call it is unknown device or some other vague name. Still, a clean install of Windows 7 on my Probook results in 2 unknown devices, and it took a good amount of time figuring out what they were. HP is not much help, as they ship the notebook out with 79 services running, so trying stuff from their support page is very much an exercise in guessing.

The power management tweaks in Linux aren't necessary for functionality, but it does give you another 30-60 minutes of battery. My point is that virtually any Windows notebook you get will require as much work as an Ubuntu setup if you want a better experience. You're either reinstalling the OS or uninstalling crap. The average Windows user just doesn't do such things willingly.

don't go there!

If you want to run ANY operating system on hardware that isn't supported by the manufacturer, run it in a virtual machine instance

Otherwise you're just asking for trouble

If you want to run Linux on bare hardware, buy supported hardware!

This is true of ANY operating system, not just Linux

I run Linux on Supermicro hardware. It says "Linux" right on the box and in the manual. They have specific Linux settings in the BIOS. They test their hardware with Linux. They list the Linux versions that they tested with, on their web site. I never have any trouble running Linux on Supermicro hardware.

Linux users can immediately blast Apple with negative comments that they're an unfriendly vendor, they're special since they control both the hardware and software, or that Linux users shouldn't buy Apple hardware, but there's plenty of Apple hardware out in the world that's popular with consumers and this is the experience they see if trying Linux.